Hello and thank you for visiting AikiWeb, the
world's most active online Aikido community! This site is home to
over 22,000 aikido practitioners from around the world and covers a
wide range of aikido topics including techniques, philosophy, history,
humor, beginner issues, the marketplace, and more.

If you wish to join in the discussions or use the other advanced
features available, you will need to register first. Registration is
absolutely free and takes only a few minutes to complete so sign up today!

A friend of mine had, or has a copy stored away "in a box somewhere" and has told several of us about the contents. It was a shock today to see it published on AJ. While many of those named have passed on, there are still a couple around that probably won't be happy to see it again. Stan Pranin is a treasure as a historian of aikido.

I was taken aback at first to see that it was only available to subscribers, which might imply a sort of ownership. But on reflection its a way of supporting a historian, and not releasing the document into the public domain at the same time?

Ha. I wish I could; turns out being a philosophy graduate isn't such a good idea under a conservative government: i'm unemployed.

I hope things are good in the promised land.

You can subscribe for a year for less than $3 per month. Anybody can skip one meal a month if they really want the information, and it supports somebody who has revolutionized the way that Aikido history is presented and understood.

If you are already a paid subscriber to the AJ regular site, then there is a link there to have your membership transferred to the new pay site.

Stan has made this new venture a pay site because he intends to put the bulk of his lifetime's work and wealth of Aikido and Daito-Ryu information (interviews, articles, photos, etc.) on that site. It is an incredible amount of work that will take years to catalog and post, but Stan wants to make sure that this irreplaceable material will survive him and be available to us in some durable fashion, so he has dedicated himself to this enormous task. The paid memberships will enable him to offset the cost of the doing.

I urge everybody who has the means to support him in this fashion, because there is history there, and many of us would never know these things about Aikido without this resource.

Exactly. Often he'll package membership with a DVD or book at a discounted rate for both. Remember that Tohei intended this to be an open letter. Those that do not want to see this letter back out in the wild, well, they have their reasons, one way or the other. On one hand, it is the genuine wish to not provoke any negative backlash: remember that this is Tohei telling the world exactly why he forever split from the Aikkai. For others, the content of this letter is accusatory and embarrassing: remember that this is Tohei telling the world exactly why he forever split from the Aikkai.

Exactly. Often he'll package membership with a DVD or book at a discounted rate for both. Remember that Tohei intended this to be an open letter. Those that do not want to see this letter back out in the wild, well, they have their reasons, one way or the other. On one hand, it is the genuine wish to not provoke any negative backlash: remember that this is Tohei telling the world exactly why he forever split from the Aikkai. For others, the content of this letter is accusatory and embarrassing: remember that this is Tohei telling the world exactly why he forever split from the Aikkai.

Yes it is - it does shed some in the american aikido group in somewhat of a bad light -

Yes it is - it does shed some in the american aikido group in somewhat of a bad light -

Greg

That's putting it lightly. I say that because I highly doubt that, in such a short time after O'Sensei passed, that something like that would have happened while he was alive. Well, perhaps I can't say that one way or the other, I just like to think that these figureheads of Aikido were actiing in a manner consistent with the respect that should be shown to the Founder for giving us Aikido.

When my full and open statement about how the information in this letter has trickled down to current day status quo between organizations, and it will, I'm sure to catch heck for it. This stuff is crazy.

There was another letter too - written in response. I wonder if that one's coming down the line...

There are also a lot of interesting side currents that never got into the letters - they hardly tell the whole story.

Best,

Chris

When I joined the Ki Society back in 1976 with the Marianas Aiki Kwai in Guam (which was a sub group of the Hawaii Aiki Kwai) the official reason given for the split was that Honbu did not teach ki and would not allow Tohei to teach it as well. Looking at it all today, it appears that that was mostly just the front cover story. If you look at the books by Kisshomaru before the split, you will see that they talk about ki as much as Tohei did.

IMO, the real underlying reason for the split was simply ego, politics, and other unsavory stuff that boils up out of organizations from time to time and that there was fault on both sides.

When I joined the Ki Society back in 1976 with the Marianas Aiki Kwai in Guam (which was a sub group of the Hawaii Aiki Kwai) the official reason given for the split was that Honbu did not teach ki and would not allow Tohei to teach it as well. Looking at it all today, it appears that that was mostly just the front cover story. If you look at the books by Kisshomaru before the split, you will see that they talk about ki as much as Tohei did.

IMO, the real underlying reason for the split was simply ego, politics, and other unsavory stuff that boils up out of organizations from time to time and that there was fault on both sides.

Greg

Of course. But I have to say - the letter is interesting to see again, but is it really news to anyone?

I think the Mitose thread, where Koichi Tohei awarded James Mitose a 10th dan in 1970 (years before he actually left hombu), in order to fund his departure from the Aikikai, has much more soap opera potential.

When I joined the Ki Society back in 1976 with the Marianas Aiki Kwai in Guam (which was a sub group of the Hawaii Aiki Kwai) the official reason given for the split was that Honbu did not teach ki and would not allow Tohei to teach it as well. Looking at it all today, it appears that that was mostly just the front cover story. If you look at the books by Kisshomaru before the split, you will see that they talk about ki as much as Tohei did.

IMO, the real underlying reason for the split was simply ego, politics, and other unsavory stuff that boils up out of organizations from time to time and that there was fault on both sides.

Greg

I HAVE Yamada's book which contains an introduction from Tohei gives him praise as his "Master Instructor" and all of the techniques are "Tohei-Waza."